“Let’s pay him half a dollar and buy him away from Belle and Sally,” suggested Amy, giggling.
But Jessie knew her chum only said that in fun. They walked slowly back to the shore. A sudden explosion of angry voices came from where the Dogtown boys and Belle and Sally were standing.
“Well, I wouldn’t trust any of you Dogtown kids!” exclaimed Belle Ringold. “Don’t you try to hide any of that wire. We need it all.”
“Hey! Who’s doing this, anyway?” complained Montmorency, in some anger.
“You are supposed to. But I’m watching you, Monty Shannon,” declared Belle. “And you need watching. The Norwoods’ chauffeur told our chauffeur what you kids did up there at Roselawn when Mark Stratford fell in his aeroplane.”
“What d’you mean?” growled Monty. “We wasn’t up there when the old plane fell.”
“But you and your crowd were there right after it. And if Mark Stratford lost his watch there I bet some of you Dogtown kids know what became of it.”
“Oh! How mean!” gasped Jessie, turning back from the launch which she had been about to board with Amy.
“I don’t know,” said Amy slowly. “We have been suspecting Monty, too, haven’t we? Only we haven’t said anything to him about it.”
“And I am just as mad with Chapman as I can be,” Jessie added. “I know he does not like the Dogtown children to come around the garage. But it is an awful thing to think that because they are poor they must be dishonest.”